Latest / Star Trails: From Backyard Astronomy to Cosmic Wonder / The Quiet Planet and the Loud Sky

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The Quiet Planet and the Loud Sky · Star Trails: From Backyard Astronomy to Cosmic Wonder

• 0:07
  Howdy Star Gazers and welcome to this episode
• 0:10
  of Star Trails. Drew here, and I'll be your guide
• 0:13
  to the night sky for the week starting July the
• 0:16
  20th through the 26th. This week we welcome one
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  of the best windows all month for deep sky observing,
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  thanks to a moonless sky midweek. I'll offer
• 0:28
  up an insane challenge to spot Pluto, and that's
• 0:32
  no joke. And later in the show, we examine mysterious
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  signals from space that defy explanation. Whether
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  you're tuning in from the backyard, the balcony,
• 0:42
  or just your imagination, I'm glad you're here.
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  So find a cozy spot, let your eyes adjust, and
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  let's see what the sky holds for us this week.
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  We start the week with a waning crescent moon,
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  just about 23 % illuminated tonight. And it's
• 0:59
  not just hanging around, it's making moves. Over
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  the next couple of mornings, the crescent moon
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  continues eastward and pulls up alongside Venus
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  and Jupiter in the pre -dawn sky. Mark your calendar
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  for the mornings of Monday and Tuesday. The moon
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  will appear near Venus first, then Jupiter, low
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  on the eastern horizon about an hour before sunrise.
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  It's an easy pairing to spot, and makes for an
• 1:28
  amazing photo -op if you can get some trees or
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  skyline in the frame. On Wednesday, we hit the
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  new moon, which means dark skies all night long
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  for the second half of the week, and a perfect
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  window for deep sky observation. By Saturday,
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  a thin waxing crescent will reappear in the evening
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  sky near Regulus, the brightest star in Leo.
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  Our planetary lineup this week is for the early
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  risers and night owls. Venus is blazing away
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  in the east just before dawn. It's your easiest
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  target, bright, unmistakable, and a great way
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  to get others interested in sky watching. Jupiter
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  is right there with it, rising a bit higher and
• 2:14
  earlier each day. The two will be fairly close
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  in the sky this week, with the moon sliding past
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  them on the 21st and 22nd. Saturn rises later,
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  around midnight, and is best viewed in the pre
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  -dawn hours low in the south. Mars is visible
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  in the west after sunset. It's not as bright
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  as the morning show, but still worth a look as
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  it moves from Leo into Virgo. And if you're really
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  feeling adventurous, here's a challenge. Pluto
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  reaches opposition on July 25th. That means it's
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  as close and bright as it gets, and naturally
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  you're going to need a substantial telescope,
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  a good star chart, and maybe a camera to even
• 3:00
  catch the dimmest glimpse of it. Here's how you
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  can spot it. First, know that even though Pluto
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  is at opposition, it's at magnitude 14 .3, which
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  means it's 10 ,000 times dimmer than the faintest
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  thing your eye can see. Obviously, you'll need
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  the darkest skies you can find, preferably Bortle
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  3 or less, and a telescope of 10 inches or larger
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  to even detect Pluto as a dim dot. Use a 12 to
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  16 inch scope if you can. Remember, Pluto doesn't
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  stand out visually. It just looks like any other
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  faint star. Tracking its motion over several
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  nights is often how observers confirm they found
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  it, as it shifts slightly against the background
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  stars. This is exactly how it was discovered
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  back in 1930 by Clyde Tombaugh and his team.
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  Even in the highest powered scopes on the planet,
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  Pluto appears as a faint star -like point. It
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  has no visible disk and shows no details. You're
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  seeing an icy dwarf planet as a speck of light
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  about 3 billion miles away. Getting eyes on Pluto
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  is beyond the means of most backyard astronomers
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  and casual observers, but if you know an advanced
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  astronomer or are a member of a club with great
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  equipment, it would be an amazing feat to see
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  it with your own eyes. Going deeper into the
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  night sky, the middle to end of the week is a
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  prime time to scan the summer Milky Way, especially
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  the rich fields around Scorpius and Sagittarius.
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  rising in the southeast after dark. Try your
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  hand at the Lagoon Nebula M8 or the Trithid Nebula
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  M20 in Sagittarius. Both are binocular visible
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  under dark skies. In Cygnus near Deneb, the North
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  America Nebula NGC 7000 is a great target for
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  wide field scopes or long exposure astrophotography.
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  And speaking of Deneb, that star forms one corner
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  of the summer triangle, along with Vega and Altair.
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  By 10pm, it's high in the eastern sky and a great
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  landmark for stargazing. Now, closer to home,
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  the Delta Aquarid meteor shower is active right
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  now, ramping up toward its late July peak. You
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  might catch a few stray meteors overnight, especially
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  in the early morning hours under dark skies.
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  Everyone's favorite shower, the Perseids, are
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  coming soon, and they'll kick off in early August.
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  We spend a lot of time looking up, watching for
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  meteor showers, planets or constellations drifting
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  through the night, but sometimes we listen. And
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  sometimes what we hear is stranger than anything
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  we could have imagined. Let me take you back
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  to an August night in 1977. Disco is still everywhere.
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  Star Wars had just come out a few months before,
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  and a team of astronomers at Ohio State University
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  were scanning the skies with a radio telescope
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  the size of a football field. It's called the
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  Big Ear, and on August 15th, it picked up something
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  odd. A signal, not just static, not a satellite,
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  but a strong, narrow band radio burst that lasted
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  72 seconds. That's exactly the duration the telescope
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  could observe a fixed point in the sky as Earth
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  rotated. The printout, a long string of computer
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  data, recorded the burst as 6EQUJ5, and that's
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  just a code to describe signal strength. But
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  it stood out from all the surrounding background
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  noise. One of the astronomers, Jerry Eamon, was
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  so stunned he grabbed a red pen and circled it,
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  and in the margin he wrote one word, wow. And
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  just like that, the most famous anomaly in radio
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  astronomy was born. The signal seemed to come
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  from the direction of the constellation Sagittarius.
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  It lined up suspiciously close to the hydrogen
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  line, a frequency some researchers believe alien
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  civilizations might choose to broadcast on, since
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  hydrogen is the most common element in the universe.
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  Naturally, scientists scrambled to observe that
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  region again, but the signal never came back.
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  It was never confirmed or explained. For nearly
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  50 years the wow signal has stood as this eerie
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  one -time whisper from the stars a Cosmic cold
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  call that never called back But here's the thing
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  lately the universe has gotten a whole lot louder
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  in just the last year astronomers have been picking
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  up brand new signals many just as baffling and
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  Some even stranger than the wow signal itself
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  One of the weirdest is called ASCAP J1832 -0911,
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  and yet that name doesn't exactly roll off the
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  tongue, but the behavior is wild. Discovered
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  earlier this year by the Australian Square Kilometer
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  Array Pathfinder, ASCAP for short, this object
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  lies somewhere in the Milky Way. It pulses every
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  22 minutes. It blasts out powerful radio waves
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  and X -rays. Then it vanishes again, hiding for
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  nearly three -quarters of an hour. It's like
• 9:03
  clockwork, but we've never seen anything like
• 9:06
  it. Astronomers think it might be a kind of magnetar.
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  That's a hypermagnetic neutron star, or maybe
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  a white dwarf with a companion. But even those
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  theories don't quite line up. It's as if this
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  object is doing something it physically shouldn't
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  be able to do, leading the team studying it to
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  call it unlike anything we've ever seen before.
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  A decade ago, another discovery came out of the
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  cosmos like waves from a Lovecraftian ham radio
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  station. This time, the culprit was a white dwarf
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  star in a tight orbit with a red dwarf. just
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  1600 light years away, which is basically next
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  door in cosmic terms. Every 125 minutes, it sends
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  out a little burst of radio waves like a slow
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  tap -tap -tap, almost like Morse code from space.
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  Turns out these two stars are locked in a chaotic
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  magnetic handshake, and their flares produce
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  this oddly timed signal. It's the first time
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  we've ever seen a white dwarf binary system behave
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  this way, and it expands the kinds of places
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  we now know can generate cosmic radio noise.
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  And of course, no modern conversation about space
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  signals is complete without talking about fast
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  radio bursts, or FRBs. These are ultra -short,
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  ultra -energetic bursts of radio waves from distant
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  galaxies. Some last just a millisecond, but in
• 10:40
  that flash they can release more energy than
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  our sun does in several days. We've been detecting
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  FRBs since 2007, and while many seem to be one
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  -off events, some repeat. A few do so at regular
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  intervals, and one discovered earlier just this
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  year, FRB 2024 -0114A, has been firing off bursts
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  so frequently, it's become one of the most active
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  repeaters ever recorded. Even stranger, another
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  FRB this year was traced to an ancient dead elliptical
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  galaxy. These galaxies don't have young stars
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  or much magnetic activity, so where's the burst
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  coming from? The answer is we really don't know.
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  Which brings us back to that lonely radio burst
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  in 1977. After all these years, and after all
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  the weirdness we've found since, there's still
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  never been another signal quite like it. No second
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  call, no follow -up ping, just 72 seconds of
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  remarkable noise. It may have been a cosmic prank
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  by nature, a one -time flare from a strange stellar
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  object, or something else. We just don't know,
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  and really, that's what makes astronomy so thrilling.
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  What keeps all of us staring up is that every
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  discovery deepens the mystery. And maybe the
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  next WOW is just waiting to be heard. If the
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  stars spoke to you this week, or if a question's
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  been on your mind, I'd love to hear it. Visit
• 12:22
  our website, StarTrails .Show, where you can
• 12:25
  contact me and explore past episodes. Be sure
• 12:29
  to follow us on Blue Sky and YouTube. Links are
• 12:32
  in the show notes. Until we meet again beneath
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  the stars, clear skies everyone.